India (Part II): Without sounding too much like a total hippy...

Dharamshala is a genuine blessed place as it is the home of the Dalai Lama. Did you know he lived in exile in India? I have been completely ignorant to this whole thing. He and his followers have been there since 1959, since the Chinese government’s cultural genocide of Tibetan Buddhism. Misunderstood or overlooked by Western media, this persecution is still happening today.  On 14^th May 1995, his holiness, the Dalai Lama, officially proclaimed a six year old boy as the reincarnation of the tenth Panchan Lama (the second most important figure in this peaceful belief system). Three days after the announcement, the boy and his parents disappeared from their home. A year later, the Chinese government admitted to having the family in their custody. The boy, who is now a 28 year old man (!), has been deprived him of his religious education and indigenous upbringing and no-one has battered an eyelid… Can you imagine if the EU kidnapped Prince George? I think the Daily Mail would have a meltdown. Indeed, maybe the EU should kidnap George! Bring him up on bouillabaisse and a Mitterrand-era education; then send him back to open the royal coffers and feed the poor armed with the finest carpaccio and chat-du-pape! I think we’d come back to England for that… 

(**I digress: on a more serious note, the cultural genocide of Tibetan Buddhism is very real. The Panchan Lama’s traditional role is to name the next Dalai Lama once he dies which obviously cannot happen now. Oh, China.)

The fact that India all the way back in ‘59 provided refugee to thousands of Tibetans - flying in the face of Chinese imperialism - speaks volumes about the inclusive and progressive attitude of India. Put simply, it’s a spiritual country, not only a “religious” one. India appreciates Buddha as peaceful warrior vis-à-vis their own more volatile Hindu gods. So, side-by-side in this small friendly town a 50/50 Tibetan-Indian population thrive, as his holiness attracts people from all corners of the globe who seek spiritual sojourns, often in the shape of month long yoga training like our dearest Flo. It’s popularity as a yoga supermarket has also bought with it a collection of boutique cafes that serve steaming bowls of healthy noodle soups, vegan chocolate balls and more ginger, lemon and honey tea. The foodie highlight for me though was the traditional Tibetan street food: Momo’s. Not dissimilar to Italian ravioli, these pasta-like parcels are filled with goodness and steamed on the street. When done well, packed with lightly spiced mutton, and finished with chilli chutney and soy sauce, we are talking about one of the world’s great dishes (that cost under £1 for a belly-full). I’m sure they will be the next hipster-hit in Brighton when we return. After Sri Lanka’s Egg Hoppers, obviously.

Dharamshala literally translates as “spiritual dwelling” and has suitably affecting natural surrounding. Set 2000m up, it’s everything you’d imagine from the greatest mountain range on Earth: snowy peaks in the distance, pine forests all around, eagles overhead etc etc. With Flo away training in Bhagsu – 2km up the hill - I stayed in a neat little room at a guesthouse ran by some Kashmiri guys where I had a hammock in the sunshine, the finest tea & charas, and plenty of headspace to read, reflect on life and doze. In this time I was also doing some intense daily yoga with a proper white-beard Indian - Yogi Sivada – and  practicing morning mediation at the Tushita Buddhist temple. I don’t connect with meditation as much as I want, but for the first time I actually found some of the sessions quite powerful - about being more selfless and thinking about other people's happiness other than one's own. And then there's the other part of mediation that's just about emptying your mind of all the bullshit - past regrets and future fantasies - and trying to just exist in the present. It's pretty tough for a miscreant like me, but I've had an inkling that I've made some progress (which is probably a very un-Zen thing to mention, therefore completely invalidating any progress!). 

To break up all this incessent soul-searching, my cousin Michael was miraculously in town (he'd been traveling through India since the wedding in Sri Lanka), and he got me piss-drunk and introduced me to bunch of likeminded humanoids. Tagging along, I went on a three day trek to a tiny mountain village called Kareri. The landscape here was just stunning. We walked for miles through verdant wheat-fields that swayed lazily creating a hypnotic, almost psychedelic haze. I had been reading The Spell of The Sensuous (Abram,  1996) - a philosophical instruction manual on how to reconnect with nature - and I felt tipsy on the cosmos. Or was it Duncan's bhang lassi? We slept three-men-in-a-bed at the village’s only “guesthouse” and the six-strong crew of American-English-and-Welsh were all amazing people. Once I returned to Dharamshala, Flo was two weeks into her training and we had a celebratory reunion. Then, embolden by my intrepid walking expedition I decided to move on, catching an overnight to via Manila about 230km East, - a traumatic, sickening 8 hour ride. At 3am a bus in-front broke down and we picked up the sleepless travelers onboard. Alas, my bus remained sleepless too.

From Manila I skipped over the gushing “Bee’s River” and arrived in Vashisht, an ancient, sacred village with near-boiling hot springs - home of the revered eponymous Vedic sage. The springs are bang in the middle of the village and hot water seems to spew from every orifice, making rivers in the gutters as local women tirelessly wash thick yak-wool blankets. One night the actual god, Vashishta, returned to the hot springs and the whole village ignited – suddenly there was dancing Babi Ji’s in the street and crowds of men armed with trumpets and a bizarre, foreboding two-tone melody. I’ve got this on shaky film somewhere. The village had a unique, visceral atmosphere that I soaked up from my balcony. Here I sat for two days straight, sketching the wooden temple in-front of me and the snow-capped mountains beyond. The end-product isn’t outstanding, but the process was a meditation itself.

My real mission to Vashisht was in search of a celebrated yogi, Raja, who I found, holed up in his basic studio - a far cry from Dharamshala’s brand of yoga-glamour. I signed up for six days of intense learning and well and truly got my chakra bouncing. Pranayama (breathing exercises), 20 minute “Ommmmmmm” sessions and exhaustive Moon Salutations. By day five I had cracked my first headstand - what a rush! I’m now fully convinced yoga is an incredibly powerful life-tool and anyone who is remotely intrigued should give it a try. The feeling of “space” is a body-mind sensation! Without sounding too much like a total hippy, for me yoga hits a very tidy balance between religion and science. 3000 years ago yoga swami’s said standing on your head is good for eyesight, stress reduction and blood circulation. And today’s doctors still agree! I sense that ancient practices having contemporary medical efficacy is rather uncanny. And once one subscribes to the body-benefits, the spiritual-nourishment-bit isn’t such a leap of faith. This is especially important given current secularisation and the trend to render all religious activity as fundamentalist and/or impotent. Religion, rituals and spirituality are a human condition. Let’s not leave them behind.

Thankfully to snap me out of all this spirituality, young Mr Too Nice – our wedding celebrant no less – joined me for the final week of MY honeymoon. How fitting? Like Michael before, Tom has been traveling through India since Sri Lanka and we had made half-baked plans to rendezvous and incredibly it actually happened! Together we would trek the Parvati Valley, a full 26km from the small village of Kasol, staying on route in guesthouses for R 150 a night (>£2) and finally ascending Kiriganga – another sacred mountain with more sacred hot springs at it’s peak! The valley was very different from the green pastures of Dharamshala, but once again utterly idyllic. We hiked through forests that evoked a place somewhere between the forest moon of Endor (Ewok territory – Return of the Jedi) and the ravines of Rivendell (Home of Elves - Lord of Rings). Incredibly, the mineral-rich hot baths completely rejuvenate tired legs and I didn’t feel a single ache. At Kiriganga’s apex we hired a surprisingly robust tent and found further solace in a wooden restaurant, complete with open fire and cosy pillows, surrounded by several very weary, very stoned corpses. Regardless of our otherworldly location – 3600m up - Tom managed to connect his phone to the speakers via the power of BlueTooth and we dominated the music – playing out Bowie (The Man Who Sold The World) and Jimi (The Wind cries Mary), amongst other essential tunes. We left to a decent reception from the crowd, as an Israeli moved in with a phone poised for more Circus Techno…

From Kiriganga, we trekked the 10km back down the mountain to the nearest road, onto the last bus of the day (5pm), to meet an overnight bus to take us all the way back to Dharamshala. We reasoned that completing the journey in one hit on the same night meant we were naturally tired enough to sleep through the potholed roads, the hairpin corners and the kamikaze driving. We arrived back in McLeod Ganj at around 4am, so we had the sad fate of having to check in a room for the night, only to leave a few hours later. Saying that, the room cost R300 (£3.50) so all was not lost. Eventually we returned to Siddarth House and were welcomed by Prince, one of the Kashmiri guys, with a warm hug and a pot of tea. Back in the land of electricity, I powered my phone to discover Flo was having her “graduation” this afternoon and was ready to be released back into the wild. We would meet at 6pm. YEEEEEEEESSSS!

Photo credits Brandon Merry